Tag Archives: b-52

US Air Force Capt Hunter Barnhill is an instructor pilot with the 37th FTS in Columbus, Mississippi. Last year, he was diagnosed with a brain tumor:

[Barnhill] went to the flight doctor who sent him to Baptist Memorial Hospital for a MRI where the doctors found a brain tumor…

The intense nature of the surgery caused him to suffer from post-operative Supplementary Motor Area Syndrome.

SMA hit hard, rendering him unable to speak and paralyzed his right side. He participated in physical and speech therapy for three months and worked to gain his abilities to sit up, walk, run and speak as he had done only weeks ago.

While shocking and traumatic, the notable theme throughout the official Air Force article is the role of Barnhill’s faith, and the impact it had on both him and those around him: Read more

Ed Brayton is a prolific and progressive atheistic blogger who is also a longtime ally of Michael “Mikey” Weinstein and his research assistant, Chris Rodda. Unlike Rodda, Brayton occasionally shows a rare streak of principle and holds his own ideologues to the same standards he demands of the “right wing fundamentalists” he so often mocks. Still, like Rodda and Weinstein, he is often blind to the traits he shares with those he ridicules.

On Monday, Brayton wrote a blog at the pay-per-click Patheos entitled “Cruz Shows He Has No Clue About the Military” in which he mocks presidential candidate and US Senator Ted Cruz for his statement saying of ISIS “we will carpet bomb them into oblivion.” Speaking to Cruz, Brayton says:

Do you or do you not know what carpet bombing is? He makes clear that he does not.

Brayton quotes Cruz waxing political in pivoting to Operation Desert Storm and the military draw down that has occurred since then: Read more

In a relatively rare occurrence for the big bomber, the US Air Force un-mothballed a 50-year-old B-52 from the storage base in Tucson, AZ, and flew it to Barksdale AFB:

The 53-year-old Stratofortress, tail number 61-1007, nicknamed the “Ghost Rider” had been in storage at the desert in the care of [AMARG] since 2008…Ghost Rider, after upgrades, will become the first B-52 to return to duty from the Boneyard.

For decades, the U.S. Air Force has grown accustomed to such superlatives as unrivaled and unbeatable. These days, some of its key combat aircraft are being described with terms like geriatric, or decrepit.